Email templates provide an easy way to send the same or similar emails regularly. I send out booking confirmations, booking amendments, requests for information daily. Having to follow Microsoft’s process to access email templates wastes time we could save, working smarter, not harder.

Need help creating an email template in Outlook? We have a recipe to help.

Microsoft’s method to access an email template

Microsoft currently states that use a template in Outlook, you must

Select New Items > More Items > Choose Form.
In the Choose Form dialogue box, in Look In, click User Templates in File System.
The default templates folder is opened. The folder location (in Windows 7 and later operating systems) is c:\users\username\appdata\roaming\Microsoft\templates. If we saved your template in a different folder, click Browse, and then select the template.
Select the email template and then click.
Make any additions or revisions to the recipients in the To, Cc, or Bcc boxes and any changes to the subject and message body.

In this article, we are going to reduce this process to 2 easy steps to access email templates

Press button on toolbar
Make any additions or revisions to the recipients in the To, Cc, or Bcc boxes and any changes to the subject and message body.

Multi user tip

If you have several users who use the same template, create a central repository in a shared folder. Change the file locations in the below Visual Basic Macro to this shared folder, and follow the toolbar steps on each machine. Now, when you change the template, all users will have the new version.

Outlook 2010 Template Toolbar Ribbon

Add a menu to Outlook and find your templates quickly

Print Tutorial Pin Tutorial

Computer Time 15

Total Time 15

Equipment

Outlook Desktop Only

Ingredients

Email Template

Email Template

Instructions

Enable Developer Menu

Open the File tab,
Go to Options > Customise Ribbon.
(Options can be found in the bottom left of the File screen)
Under Main Tabs on the right hand side, select the Developer check box.

Visual Basic Macro

Open your new Developer menu and select Visual Basic
A new screen will pop up. On the left select Project 1, left click and press Insert > Module.
Paste the below VBA code in the new screen
This is the foundations of our Toolbar
Private Sub MakeItem()
Set newItem = Application.CreateItemFromTemplate(template)
newItem.Display
Set newItem = Nothing
End Sub
For each toolbar button you require paste the below VBA code renaming the macro and file location of the Outlook Template
Sub MacroName()
'Rename each Macro to anything as long as they are not the same
template = "C: File Location Of Your Outlook Template.oft"
'By default templates are stored in C: Users UserName AppData Roaming Microsoft Templates
MakeItem
End Sub
Press save and close

Add Toolbar

Now we have a few macros. Let's add them to a toolbar. Open the customise ribbon menu (File > Options > Customise Ribbon), on the lower right press New Tab and then Rename the newly created Tab & Group
Select your new Group then towards the top left use the drop down menu to select Macros. Select each macro then press Add found in the centre of the 2 columns. Do this for each macro you will add.
To make the toolbar a little nicer, we can rename each macro to a more logical name like Amended Confirmation and also select an icon that would best suit its usage.
Once finished, press OK. Your Outlook toolbar is now ready to go. You may get a warning about Macro security when you press the toolbar for the first time. We can change this

Enable Macros

Click File > Options > Trust Center
Press Trust Center Settings
Select Macro Options
Select the security level you require, I have set this to Notification for all macros. this provides some form of security and will only warn the user the first time they attempt to use the toolbar in each session
Click OK.

Post Author

Tom Hobbs

Tom has worked for small business for 20 years providing IT support and know how to entrepreneurs

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